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I agree with your federalism comment. However, I can understand why people are so confused with the issue when the FDR initiated programs that directly benefited the people instead of the state and the federal government has used those expanded powers (namely the interstate commerce clause) to grab jurisdiction on things like minimum wage and drug laws.

This isn't about public health care system versus private; every state is heavily involved in the medical industry in their states, and to my understanding both "sides" agree that there is no state that is doing a very good job of it. And strangely enough each "side" are using that as their respective core argument for and against a federal take over.

If I were a welfare baby hoping to win the dole, I would prefer each state be left to try whatever it likes and when some state finally comes up with a system that doesn't suck ass, that is where I will move to. Funny enough, if you are on the complete other side and don't think you will ever get sick, but just in case keep enough cash on hand in case you require the services of a doctor, then you can move to the state of your choice as well. And really, if it isn't that important, what is with all the debate anyway?

The biggest pushers of government health care isn't really the people who need access to health care. It's people pushing an ideology onto others for various reasons.

Think about this, if you're poor, you generally are covered by a government program already with the exception of some single people with no children. If your wealthy, then you already have coverage because you don't want an illness to challenge your wealth. So that leaves us with is approximately 46 million Americans out of 307 million (population estimate by the census bureau last year) who do not have health coverage. If this site is to be believed, 17 million of those uninsured make $50k or more a year and could afford insurance if they wanted it or spent their money a little more wisely. That leaves us with about 29 million people out of 307 million or roughly 10% of the population that doesn't have health care insurance or is covered be an existing government program. We can dwindle that number down a little more if we look at the claim that 25% of the 29 million uninsured qualify for an existing government program but aren't enrolled for whatever reason. This would drop the number down to 21 million or so (roughly 7% of the population) but that's sort of irrelevant because they are not covered as of now.

Now if we take this data and look at how many people support the government health care and who are apposed to it, less then half of the country support it and more then half appose it. But half of 307 million is about 125 million more people then those with no coverage. It isn't really welfare babies hoping to win the dole who are in support of this (of course there probably are some, but it's far more complex then this). What it is about is where people in general aren't satisfied with the insurance services they are getting right now and have been scared to death by claims that things will happen which might not be true in their case.

Life time caps on services or payouts is one of them. When people take out a policy, even if it's the employer provided policy, the life time cap is known in advance but it's a "major travesty" or "unjust act" when someone gets ill who is under-insured and reaches that cap. It gets presented as if the caps are arbitrary and made to apply at the whim of the insurance provider for the sole purpose of not holding up their end of the deal. Again, this is presented in this way to advance an agenda or ideology. The caps are in place to control costs and the costs of the policy is reflected by that control. The agenda may be to get coverage they didn't pay for in the first place or to implement a socialist or political agenda like government healt

Everytime the summer is hot or a storm hits the coast it is blamed on anthropogenic global warming (AGW). But when it gets cold, suddenly "wheather is not climate". When the satellites are showing no warming for the last 10 years we are told that "there is inter-decadal variability".

If we ignore the science (greenhouse fingerprint, solar forcing, ...) and just have a look at popular beliefs: Just 40 years ago the "discussion" was tilted the other way and we were anticipating the beginning of the next ice age.

You seem to be well versed in how peer-review _should_ work. That is, unfortunately, not the same thing as how it actually works in reality.

You might want to study "Climategate", especially Phil Jones (paper-selecting expert for the IPCC, at CRU) opinions on how to deal with peer-review when it doesn't suit his agenda.

I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow - even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is !

http://businessandmedia.org/articles/2009/20091203151910.aspx

Mind-opening.

About 20 years ago, the Audi 5000S had the same supposed problem. You can read about the problem at the "New York Times", the "Los Angeles Times", and the "Business & Media Institute".

The trouble began when "60 Minutes" (of CBS News) broadcast a story about a woman who killed her son when she accidentally pressed the accelerator pedal instead of the brake pedal. Her son was standing in front of the car. The woman, refusing to admit guilt, accused Audi of producing a defective car which accelerates automatically without driver intervention. She even filed a lawsuit against Audi. (Later, the court determined that she was at fault, but that fact was never broadcast in the original "60 Minutes" program.)

The sales of Audi vehicles fell dramatically after that "60 Minutes" program.

The Audi 5000S was never defective, but it did have 1 minor inconvenience. The accelerator pedal and the brake pedal were much closer to each other than they were in a traditional American car. This closeness was something to which a small subset of American drivers could not become accustomed. They sometimes did press the accelerator pedal when they intended to press the brake pedal.

As for the Toyota Camry, is it defective? The probability of it being defective is higher than the probability of the Audi 5000S being defective. Consumer-safety standards in Japan are lower than the standards in the European Union.

Even from an engineering perspective, the Toyota Camry is a dangerous design. For example, the transmission is mechanically separated from the automatic-transmission lever (that the driver uses to change gears). The lever is connected to an electronic box that sends some electrical signals -- along copper wires -- to the tranmission to control it: the process is drive-by-wire. Supposedly, Toyota used 2 identical sets of wires (for reasons of fault tolerance) from the electronic box to the transmission.

Another participant in this discussion claims that Toyota also mechanically separated the accelerator pedal from the fuel line. Toyota appears to have used drive-by-wire throughout the design to eliminate some metal -- thus saving money.

Do not trust the fault tolerance in mass-merchandise products. Fault tolerance is expensive and is meant to be expensive. Toyota likely tried to save some money on the fault tolerance, and it was not able to protect the vehicle from the 1-in-1,000,000 chance of a transient fault in the electronic circuits. The chance of a glitch is low, but the probability that it occurs exactly once among 200,000 vehicles is high.

The fact that only a handful of people have been affected by the freak accelerations matches a distribution of a low-probability electrical glitch. If you own a Toyota Camry, I suggest that you sell it as quickly as possible and get an old-fashioned-technology vehicle without the drive-by-wire. The Ford Fusion exceeds the quality of the Toyota Camry, does not use drive-by-wire, and costs much less than the Toyota deathtrap. Think about it.

You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. You are misusing the term "fascism" so egregiously that your entire post is worthless.

Perhaps, Mr. Coward, O Knowledgeable One, you would be so kind to enlighten us. I doubt very much you have any idea what fascism is about.

This just might possibly enlighten you if you give it a chance: The Real Threat of Fascism

"Fascist dictatorships were borne to power in each of these countries by big business, and they served the interests of big business with remarkable ferocity. These facts have been lost to the popular consciousness in North America. Fascism could therefore return to us, and we will not even recognize it. Indeed, Huey Long, one of America's most brilliant and most corrupt politicians, was once asked if America would ever see fascism. His answer was, 'Yes, but we will call it anti-fascism.'"

And this: From the New Mercantilism to Economic Fascism

"Under fascism, business enterprises were organized into state-mandated cartels. The cartels, under government supervision, specified what would be produced, how much each cartel member could produce, at what prices they might hire labor and resources, and for what prices they might sell their output on the market."

And this: Government's Current Role in Business the 'Route' to Fascism

"A textbook definition explains that fascism embodied corporatism, which is an economic structure controlled by the government. Sowell said that's exactly what is happening in some sectors of the U.S. economy:

"Beck: So what route is that again?

"Sowell: That the private people still own the businesses but the politicians tell them what to do.

"Beck: Right, but isn't that, I'm trying to remember, that's uh...

"Sowell: That's fascism.

"Beck: Yes, I was going to say, I knew it was a bad one. And I was going to say, I think that's fascism.

Try not to fixate on whether the state controls business, or business controls the state. The easy tell of fascism is that the state and business are IN LEAGUE, and that they are conspiring off the books and for mutual benefit.

From http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2006/20061108124934.aspx
The call for global warming spending has been heard before. In 1997, the U.S. Senate spoke out 95-0 against the Kyoto treaty, which was designed to limit greenhouse gas emissions of the world's nations. If the United States had joined that agreement, it was estimated to cost up to $440 billion per year.
And an interesting report about GW from here:
http://cei.org/cei_files/fm/active/0/DOC062509-004.pdf

Go fuck yourself, you deliberately ignorant mouth-breathing moron. Bush didn't "allow it", Bush TRIED TO STOP IT.

Here's the problem, reported by the Washington Post in 2004:

Report Slams Fannie Mae
Fannie Mae, the giant mortgage finance company, has used improper accounting methods that raise serious questions about the quality of its management and the validity of its financial reports, government regulators reported yesterday.

Though it didn't quantify the effect of what it called pervasive misapplication of accounting rules on the company's books, the report by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight cited one instance in 1998 where the company inappropriately deferred $200 million of estimated expenses, which enabled management to receive full annual bonuses. Had Fannie recorded the expenses in 1998, no bonus would have been paid, the report said.

The report also detailed numerous transactions over several years where it said Fannie Mae management intentionally smoothed out gyrations in its earnings to show investors it was a low-risk company. Fannie "maintained a corporate culture that emphasized stable earnings at the expense of accurate financial disclosures," regulators said in a letter to the company.

Here's who put a stop to the stopping:

Video of DEMOCRATS covering for those problems reported above.

Here's a list of some of those DEMOCRATS:

Maxine Waters: Through nearly a dozen hearings, we were frankly trying to fix something that wasnâ(TM)t broke. Mr. Chairman, we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac, and particularly at Fannie Mae, under the outstanding leadership of Franklin Raines.

Gregory Meeks: ⦠I'm just pissed off at OFHEO [the regulators trying to warn Congress of insolvency at the GSEs], because if it wasn't for you, I don't think we'd be here in the first place. ... There's been nothing that indicated that's wrong with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac has come up on its own ... The question that then comes up is the competence that your agency has with reference to deciding and regulating these GSEs.

Lacy Clay: This hearing is about the political lynching of Franklin Raines.

Barney Frank: I don't see anything in this report that raises safety and soundness problems.

Maxine Waters? Hmmm, could she be a CROOK?

Waters Helped Bank Whose Stock She Once Owned

WASHINGTON -- When Rep. Barney Frank was looking to aid a Boston-based lender last fall, the Massachusetts Democrat urged Maxine Waters, a colleague on the House Financial Services Committee, to "stay out of it," he says.

The reason: Ms. Waters, a longtime congresswoman from California, had close ties to the minority-owned institution, OneUnited Bank.

Ms. Waters and her husband have both held financial stakes in the bank. Until recently, her husband was a director. At the same time, Ms. Waters has publicly boosted OneUnited's executives and criticized its government regulators during congressional hearings. Last fall, she helped secure the bank a meeting with Treasury officials.

Barney Frank?

Media Mum on Barney Frank's Fannie Mae Love Connection

Prominent Democrats ran Fannie Mae, the same government-sponsored enterprise (GSE) that donated campaign cash to top Democrats. And one of Fannie Mae's main defenders in the House - Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., a recipient of more than $40,000 in campaign donations from Fan

FDR's spending wasn't the only thing that ended the great depression, but it sure helped.

Actually a study by UCLA economists Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian concluded FDR prolonged and made more sever the Great Depression.

Falcon

I read this article a few hours ago from Drudge ... and while the article may be 100% accurate and irrefutable, there was another article that was also on there, also published today:

Earth on the Brink of an Ice Age

I'm not sure if the left hand knows exactly what the right hand is doing ... but to me, it seems like two completely different scenarios.

Obviously, the earth has cooled before ... and it's warmed up before. Nobody is disputing this fact.

Certainly, in the past few decades, CO2 has risen. And, for the past 650,000 years, it has been fluctuating, but topped out around 360ppm. Though if you go back even further, you'll see that CO2 has been much higher (see pg 23) than recent times. One has to question what is the optimal level for the Earth? Is it now ... at 385ppm, or in pre-historic times at over 1000ppm?

By using 7g of CO2 emissions per search, the article really gives such a vague scare of global warming. By my interpretation, we should shut down that evil CO2 emitter, at least thats what they are implying. Alternatively, just create a new tax obviously, this will reduce levels ... somehow.

As far as a solution for the "global warming" problem ... I'll have to think about it while I turn up the heat in the house while I shovel snow outside.

BTW, yes I do know that Weather != Climate ... but currently, it is just fsck'n cold.

Personally, I found it painful watching people claim we were still in a recession in 2006, whereas the linked article points out that the last recession ended in 2001. I have no problem believing we're starting into a recession now, but the drumbeat of negative economic spin for pretty much all for GWB's presidential career, especially around any election season, makes it difficult to take media doom and gloom seriously, and easy to point out flaws in the claims last year. Taking it seriously is likely to induce an even worse economy.

Do Obama and the Democrats deserve a lift in the polls as a result of the financial and mortgage problems? The answer from history is a clear NO. Here's the lead of a New York Times story on September 30, 1999:

"Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending" [link below]. That's 1999 folks. Clinton Administration, I believe.

Here's the lead of a New York Times story on Sept. 11, 2003:

"The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago. "[see link below] The Democrats killed the reforms.

McCain said in co-sponsoring the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190:

"If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system and the economy as a whole. The Democrats killed the Bill.

What was Barney Frank and fellow Democrats saying at the time of these attempted reforms? According to reports, Representative Barney Frank(D-MA) claimed of the thrifts :

"These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis, the more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

Representative Mel Watt (D-NC) added of the reforms "I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing." [ See Community Reinvestment Act, link below ]

Even Bill Clinton points to Congressional Democrats failure to deal with Fannie and Freddie as a primary cause.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsynspIqAoE

The link below contains a purported list of the top 25 in Congress who got contributions from the folks at Fannie and Freddie. Obama is listed third, after Dodd and Kerry, even though Obama is just a junior Senator. Obama is followed next by Clinton. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi are on the list as well.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&artnum=1&issue=20080918

Then there is the Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd who allegedly got special mortgage deals from Countrywide, who gave preferential rates to 'friends' of company's chairman.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25140560/

For an interesting article purporting to detail the House Financial Services Committee Chairs long history with Fannie Mae, See:
http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx

"House Financial Services Committee Chair promoted GSEs while former 'spouse' was Fannie Mae executive."

The link below describes how some in Congress tried to use the original version of the bailout bill to divert money eventually recovered to groups like ACORN, a group Obama has a long association with. See:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122247015469280723.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

And then there is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who allegedly has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm.

http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/oct/01/pelosis-pac-pays-bills-for-spouses-firm.

See also:

Do Obama and the Democrats deserve a lift in the polls as a result of the financial and mortgage problems? The answer from history is a clear NO. Here's the lead of a New York Times story on September 30, 1999:

"Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending" [link below]. That's 1999 folks. Clinton Administration, I believe.

Here's the lead of a New York Times story on Sept. 11, 2003:

"The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago. "[see link below] The Democrats killed the reforms.

McCain said in co-sponsoring the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190:

"If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system and the economy as a whole. The Democrats killed the Bill.

What was Barney Frank and fellow Democrats saying at the time of these attempted reforms? According to reports, Representative Barney Frank(D-MA) claimed of the thrifts :

"These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis, the more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

Representative Mel Watt (D-NC) added of the reforms "I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing." [ See Community Reinvestment Act, link below ]

Even Bill Clinton points to Congressional Democrats failure to deal with Fannie and Freddie as a primary cause.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsynspIqAoE

The link below contains a purported list of the top 25 in Congress who got contributions from the folks at Fannie and Freddie. Obama is listed third, after Dodd and Kerry, even though Obama is just a junior Senator. Obama is followed next by Clinton. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi are on the list as well.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&artnum=1&issue=20080918

Then there is the Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd who allegedly got special mortgage deals from Countrywide, who gave preferential rates to 'friends' of company's chairman.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25140560/

For an interesting article purporting to detail the House Financial Services Committee Chairs long history with Fannie Mae, See:
http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx

"House Financial Services Committee Chair promoted GSEs while former 'spouse' was Fannie Mae executive."

The link below describes how some in Congress tried to use the original version of the bailout bill to divert money eventually recovered to groups like ACORN, a group Obama has a long association with. See:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122247015469280723.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

And then there is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who allegedly has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm.

http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/oct/01/pelosis-pac-pays-bills-for-spouses-firm.

See also:

And don't forget that Biden is against Net Neutrality too!

Do Obama and the Democrats deserve a lift in the polls as a result of the financial and mortgage problems? The answer from history is a clear NO. Here's the lead of a New York Times story on September 30, 1999:

"Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending" [link below]. That's 1999 folks. Clinton Administration, I believe.

Here's the lead of a New York Times story on Sept. 11, 2003:

"The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago. "[see link below] The Democrats killed the reforms.

McCain said in co-sponsoring the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190:

"If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system and the economy as a whole. The Democrats killed the Bill.

What was Barney Frank and fellow Democrats saying at the time of these attempted reforms? According to reports, Representative Barney Frank(D-MA) claimed of the thrifts :

"These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis, the more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

Representative Mel Watt (D-NC) added of the reforms "I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing." [ See Community Reinvestment Act, link below ]

Even Bill Clinton points to Congressional Democrats failure to deal with Fannie and Freddie as a primary cause.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsynspIqAoE [youtube.com]

The link below contains a purported list of the top 25 in Congress who got contributions from the folks at Fannie and Freddie. Obama is listed third, after Dodd and Kerry, even though Obama is just a junior Senator. Obama is followed next by Clinton. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi are on the list as well.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&artnum=1&issue=20080918 [investors.com]

Then there is the Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd who allegedly got special mortgage deals from Countrywide, who gave preferential rates to 'friends' of company's chairman.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25140560/ [msn.com]

For an interesting article purporting to detail the House Financial Services Committee Chairs long history with Fannie Mae, See:
http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx [businessandmedia.org]

"House Financial Services Committee Chair promoted GSEs while former 'spouse' was Fannie Mae executive."

The link below describes how some in Congress tried to use the original version of the bailout bill to divert money eventually recovered to groups like ACORN, a group Obama has a long association with. See:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122247015469280723.html?mod=googlenews_wsj [wsj.com]

And then there is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who allegedly has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm.

http://www.washt

Do Obama and the Democrats deserve a lift in the polls as a result of the financial and mortgage problems? The answer from history is a clear NO. Here's the lead of a New York Times story on September 30, 1999:

"Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending" [link below]. That's 1999 folks. Clinton Administration, I believe.

Here's the lead of a New York Times story on Sept. 11, 2003:

"The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago. "[see link below] The Democrats killed the reforms.

McCain said in co-sponsoring the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190:

"If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system and the economy as a whole. The Democrats killed the Bill.

What was Barney Frank and fellow Democrats saying at the time of these attempted reforms? According to reports, Representative Barney Frank(D-MA) claimed of the thrifts :

"These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis, the more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

Representative Mel Watt (D-NC) added of the reforms "I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing." [ See Community Reinvestment Act, link below ]

Even Bill Clinton points to Congressional Democrats failure to deal with Fannie and Freddie as a primary cause.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsynspIqAoE

The link below contains a purported list of the top 25 in Congress who got contributions from the folks at Fannie and Freddie. Obama is listed third, after Dodd and Kerry, even though Obama is just a junior Senator. Obama is followed next by Clinton. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi are on the list as well.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&artnum=1&issue=20080918

Then there is the Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd who allegedly got special mortgage deals from Countrywide, who gave preferential rates to 'friends' of company's chairman.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25140560/

For an interesting article purporting to detail the House Financial Services Committee Chairs long history with Fannie Mae, See:
http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx

"House Financial Services Committee Chair promoted GSEs while former 'spouse' was Fannie Mae executive."

The link below describes how some in Congress tried to use the original version of the bailout bill to divert money eventually recovered to groups like ACORN, a group Obama has a long association with. See:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122247015469280723.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

And then there is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who allegedly has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm.

http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/oct/01/pelosis-pac-pays-bills-for-spouses-firm.

See also:

Do Obama and the Democrats deserve a lift in the polls as a result of the financial and mortgage problems? The answer from history is a clear NO. Here's the lead of a New York Times story on September 30, 1999:

"Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending" [link below]. That's 1999 folks. Clinton Administration, I believe.

Here's the lead of a New York Times story on Sept. 11, 2003:

"The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago. "[see link below] The Democrats killed the reforms.

McCain said in co-sponsoring the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190:

"If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system and the economy as a whole. The Democrats killed the Bill.

What was Barney Frank and fellow Democrats saying at the time of these attempted reforms? According to reports, Representative Barney Frank(D-MA) claimed of the thrifts :

"These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis, the more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

Representative Mel Watt (D-NC) added of the reforms "I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing." [ See Community Reinvestment Act, link below ]

Even Bill Clinton points to Congressional Democrats failure to deal with Fannie and Freddie as a primary cause.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsynspIqAoE

The link below contains a purported list of the top 25 in Congress who got contributions from the folks at Fannie and Freddie. Obama is listed third, after Dodd and Kerry, even though Obama is just a junior Senator. Obama is followed next by Clinton. Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi are on the list as well.

http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&artnum=1&issue=20080918

Then there is the Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher J. Dodd who allegedly got special mortgage deals from Countrywide, who gave preferential rates to 'friends' of company's chairman.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25140560/

For an interesting article purporting to detail the House Financial Services Committee Chairs long history with Fannie Mae, See:
http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx

"House Financial Services Committee Chair promoted GSEs while former 'spouse' was Fannie Mae executive."

The link below describes how some in Congress tried to use the original version of the bailout bill to divert money eventually recovered to groups like ACORN, a group Obama has a long association with. See:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122247015469280723.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

And then there is House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who allegedly has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm.

http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/oct/01/pelosis-pac-pays-bills-for-spouses-firm.

See also:

The problem is that the people who were supposed to oversee Fannie Mae are the same people that are now supporting a certain Democrat candidate for president, and it would not be beneficial for the media to expose those relationships to the public-at-large until after the election.

• Jamie Gorelick, on the board of Fannie Mae, received > $75 million in bonuses when the company was "doing well"; she is now assisting Obama's campaign. Investigation would reveal that FM was "cooking the books" in order to pump up executive bonuses.
• Barney Frank, served on the House Banking Committee, and stopped many legislation attempts to regulate Fannie Mae.
• Frank Raines, former Fannie Mae executive and Clinton budget directory, received preferentially lower interest rates on personal loans. He is now advising the Obama campaign.
• Democratic Congressional Black Caucus, who was praised by Fannie Mae's CEO Daniel Mudd for passing beneficial legislation, in the name of loosening regulations allowing people with poor credit scores to overextend themselves with home loans. We know today how that turned out.

I don't understand how the Enron Trial is on the tip of everyone's tongue, but the media isn't calling to put these banking executive in jail for a fraud that is 10x worse!

Stern took it a step even further and called Democrats on the FCC "communists" and referred to their tactics as "gangsterism."

I don't necessarily agree with Stern, just adding some relevant info.

.
For the cannibalism, not quite that extreme but basically fortelling massive starvation and hundreds of millions of deaths because we're overpopulated: The Population Bomb by Paul Erlich.

It certainly doesn't help the anthropogenic global warming adherents that Erlich is also a vocal supporter of their position, given he so obviously blew the whole overpopulation thing...

I'll give you evolution. It's a mind-boggling process, that over billions of years, life sprang into being and then through random chance changed to make people, but I don't see any other plausible theories out there, and ID people presume they have any idea what God's methods are. But Global Warming? Global Warming is a political movement to transfer wealth from the 1st world to the 3rd world through taxes and "Carbon Credits" (I'd love to get in on that scam, though, believe me). Let's not equate a relatively well-established scientific theory with a 25-year cycle of hysteria (see article Fire and Ice

The prophets of 1970 said:
 
The world would be covered in ice by now.

The Goreacle is not pleased!!!
Repent!!

Buy your Eco-Indulgences.

And, Jon Stewart's take.

Well if it is any consolation we will probably experience global cooling in a few decades just as we did about 4 decades ago. The strange thing is that not every time in the past has there been people running around with their heads cutoff screaming end of days because of the temperature change but for some reason we have that now and the only difference is that the temperature is moving in the other direction. And at the very least, the current global warming proponents are treading new ground with pushing their agenda by making death threats against those who don't agree with them. Who would have thought that denying human involvement in global temperature changes would justify such violence. A century ago global cooling caused quite a stir. It seems scientists don't ever know what is really going to happen to the global temperature but if the past few millennia are any indication it seems that nothing globally catastrophic will happen (maybe given enough millennia another Ice Age will occur but, just as before, it won't be anything we can help because we won't be the cause).

Nonsense. You go back and read old newspapers. There was a famous Newsweek story about global cooling in 1975, which did not reflect the scientific opinion of the time, and pretty much nothing before that.

"
Here is a quote from the New York Times reporting on fears of an approaching ice age.

"Geologists Think the World May be Frozen Up Again."

That sentence appeared over 100 years ago in the February 24, 1895 edition of the New York Times.

Let me repeat. 1895, not 1995.

A front page article in the October 7, 1912 New York Times, just a few months after the Titanic struck an iceberg and sank, declared that a prominent professor "Warns Us of an Encroaching Ice Age."

The very same day in 1912, the Los Angeles Times ran an article warning that the "Human race will have to fight for its existence against cold." An August 10, 1923 Washington Post article declared: "Ice Age Coming Here."

By the 1930's, the media took a break from reporting on the coming ice age and instead switched gears to promoting global warming:

"America in Longest Warm Spell Since 1776; Temperature Line Records a 25-year Rise" stated an article in the New York Times on March 27, 1933. The media of yesteryear was also not above injecting large amounts of fear and alarmism into their climate articles.

An August 9, 1923 front page article in the Chicago Tribune declared:

"Scientist Says Arctic Ice Will Wipe Out Canada." The article quoted a Yale University professor who predicted that large parts of Europe and Asia would be "wiped out" and Switzerland would be "entirely obliterated."

A December 29, 1974 New York Times article on global cooling reported that climatologists believed "the facts of the present climate change are such that the most optimistic experts would assign near certainty to major crop failure in a decade."

The article also warned that unless government officials reacted to the coming catastrophe, "mass deaths by starvation and probably in anarchy and violence" would result. In 1975, the New York Times reported that "A major cooling [was] widely considered to be inevitable." These past predictions of doom have a familiar ring, don't they? They sound strikingly similar to our modern media promotion of former Vice president's brand of climate alarmism.

After more than a century of alternating between global cooling and warming, one would think that this media history would serve a cautionary tale for today's voices in the media and scientific community who are promoting yet another round of eco-doom.

Much of the 100-year media history on climate change that I have documented here today can be found in a publication titled "Fire and Ice" from the Business and Media Institute. http://www.businessandmedia.org/specialreports/200 6/fireandice/fireandice_timeswarns.asp "

From: http://epw.senate.gov/speechitem.cfm?party=rep&id= 263759

Even if true, it is irrelevant to the point under discussion, which was the fact that the actual funding for climate science does not originate in any significant way from your leftist conspiracy.

1. Having to keep government funding rolling in is a big part of the problem.

2. Once this stuff hits the desk of UN beaurocrats, this BECOMES what it is about.

3. Scientists, like journalists, are prone to bias and activism just like everyone else.

Non sequitur. We were talking about typographical errors in the IPCC AR4. Perhaps you would like to stick to the points being discussed, instead of launching into an irrelevant anti-leftist tirade every time you're proven wrong.

So if I critique the tables and the data, will I be convicted of "injecting confusion in the mix in order to slow policy down" or will I be labelled a "denier," or both?

more media hype than anything. Over the last 100 yrs (yes, since 1895), the media has flopped from global warming to global ice age scares. There seems to always be a scientist somewhere that believes one or the other theory, convenient for the media to pick up whenever they feel the winds of fear should change. Just read:

Fire and Ice